The Life of the Dead
by DaenerysTargary3n
Summary: Mark, Lexie, Hahn and George watch from Heaven as Season 9 of Grey's Anatomy happens. Does not include much of the action of the show, more about the lives of the deceased in heaven happening alongside those of the surviving cast.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note: **This was an idea that occurred to me after I read "The Lovely Bones" by Alice Sebold and works along the same lines. The characters that have died in "Grey's Anatomy", aka Mark, Lexie, George and Erica, whom I have decided should be dead just to give some bite to the characters in heaven, are seeing their friends and family cope with their loss but I do not intend just to transcribe bits of the show. Please do read and review this story and let me know what you think!

Many thanks in advance,

_**DaenerysTargary3n**_

* * *

"_The life of the dead is placed in the memory of the living."_

~ Marcus Tullius Cicero

He saw it happen in slow motion before his eyes and knew, just knew that he had to do something. He felt his body jump into action before he could think or feel or hesitate. The next thing he knew was that the length of his body slammed against the woman's slender frame and his arms wrapped themselves around her and turned her away from the bus that was hurtling towards them. Then, his arms released and his charge was free.

Then, there was nothing. He felt nothing. He could see nothing. He could only hear the high-pitched screams of the woman who should have received the brunt of the impact from the moving vehicle on the roadside and the screech of the tyres as the driver reacted to the thud of human flesh coming into contact with metal moving at great speed. Then, there was chaos.

He lost consciousness after that and when he next came to, he was in a strangely familiar place, hearing recognisable voices, the voices of his friends, friends who had no clue that it was him who was lying on the gurney, his face burned away and his limbs sticking out at painful angles. He attempted to speak, to get out some words so he could get somebody, _anybody_ to realise that it was him, Dr. George O'Malley, who was here, dying, not some nameless John Doe, but the words would not form in his mangled voice box, nor would they pass through his crushed larynx past his singed lips and be understandable. The words would merely register as grunts and groans of the agony of the injuries he sustained in the accident.

During the run-of-the-mill influx of surgeons into his room, he thought he recognised the presence of Dr. Miranda Bailey, the finest surgeon Seattle Grace Hospital had ever known, better than the Chief, better than Ellis Grey because of her drive and her talent and her dedication to the students she took under her wing. Miranda Bailey would surely know him, know the man she named her only son for, but she did not.

Only when he found himself in the company of his good friend and former crush, Meredith Grey, did an idea occur to him that would at least give her a clue that one of her dearest friends and most respected colleagues was one of her patients. As the medical team swarmed around him and fought for his life, he flung his hand out splayed, needing her to mimic his gesture so he could trace three symbols on her beautiful and healing hands.

Her eyes met his as his scorched, fractured fingers moved quietly and gently on her palm, writing the numbers '007', numbers that had continued to define him since that first, failed appendectomy. He could only hope that she would be savvy enough to get what he was telling her, so it was wondrous relief and ecstatic gratitude that coursed through his veins when the abject horror and debilitating fear and paralysing grief appeared on her stunning face.

"George?" She whispered, unable to truly believe that it was her cherished friend, who was like a brother to her that lay broken and bleeding before her.

If only, if only he had the strength and wherewithal to respond, he would have nodded or given her some sign that her deductions were true, but unfortunately, he had used up all the energy he possessed giving her that brief message. She would just have to have conviction in her own belief and in what she had just been told, though George was comforted that if anyone was going to have faith in her own ability to understand what a dying man had just written on her palm, it was Meredith Grey.

Suddenly, as if only minutes had passed, it seemed as though the entire hospital had heard that it was Dr. George O'Malley, the Heart-in-the-Elevator Guy, Bambi, Foetus, who had saved a woman from being hit by a bus and then was fatally injured in doing so. He suspected that outside his room at that point, the entire team was asking how he had been identified when his face was grotesque and he had no ability to speak. Poor Meredith…having to explain that she knew it was George because he had written three numbers on her hand. His friends would call her crazy and not believe her, though he did not know if there would be another way to prove that it was indeed him.

In his foggy state, he thought he heard one person walk into his room with purpose and stop next to his left side and pick up his less injured hand and examine it. It perplexed him for a short time as he could not imagine why his left hand would be of such interest to anyone as it was by no means the most painful part of his anatomy, nor was it a good source of identification, but then the memory of nights spent in the hotel that had been his and his wife's home crossed his mind. He was thankful in that instant that he had turned Calliope Torres into Callie O'Malley because she had sweetly remembered that he had a birthmark on his hand that probably had not been decimated in the accident, so she would be able to tell everyone that it was him in the hospital.

The instant he knew she knew that it was her ex-husband was the second she burst out in quiet sobs, keening over his wretched body having noticed the familiar blemish which she had taunted him for during their brief but loving marriage.

He died on the operating table, in his beloved mentor and friend Miranda Bailey's OR and then as per his wishes, his organs were harvested and went round the country to save others. As George O'Malley lived so did he die…

* * *

Erica Hahn left her job feeling betrayed and unloved and disrespected as both a surgeon and a person. She had broken things off with Callie and emailed Chief Webber her resignation, not wishing to set eyes on that man's face ever again. Then, she had returned to her apartment and packed her affairs and headed to Boston, where she knew she would be able to find work, though she did wonder if she had lost faith in the whole industry after discovering what had occurred on the other end of the Denny Duquette debacle. She had, after all, been aware of what had happened on the Seattle Presbyterian side, but she had had no clue what had gone down on the Seattle Grace end. Knowing that Izzie Stevens had been permitted to continue practicing medicine even though her decisions on that night had effectively sentenced two people to premature deaths, was agony for the cardiac surgeon. Even more unbearable for her was the fact that everyone at her former place of work seemed to be okay with that, even Callie, whom she had expected (not unreasonably, she felt) to be on her side, but instead her girlfriend had told her to leave things well alone. It was as though she did not know anyone in that place! She knew she just had to get out before it started to change her and before she knew it, she would wake up one day and find that she was able to tolerate such a thing too.

She just drove and drove until she reached the East Coast and Boston, which was a haven for her. Boston was a great city in which to practice medicine and just concentrate on her research and surgeries. It was where she should have gone to begin with, but she had called her old tutor and he had managed to finagle her a position as an attending at The Brigham, so she would not be out of work and they were also content to fund her research which had lost to Preston Burke for the Harper Avery, but she would present it again next year.

On her first day at work, she had met one of the attending neurosurgeons and after he invited her for a couple of drinks after work to welcome her to the city, they had gone back to his apartment and things got intimate between them. Erica just wanted to erase the memory of Callie Torres from her body and her newfound sexuality too. She did find that she was attracted to David McKittrick but when on their fifth 'date' she began to experience severe pains in her abdomen and had to be carted back to the hospital where she worked as a patient, their short-lived fling was over and she found that she was not bothered by that at all.

When the OB/GYN attending examined her, the look of worry that crossed her face when her lower abdomen was tender, Erica knew meant that her prognosis was nowhere in the vicinity of good.

"What is it? Just spit it out!" Erica bellowed at her doctor anxiously.

Dr. Grundig looked apologetically at her, "I am sorry, Dr. Hahn, we have to do some more tests to get a better picture of what's going on here."

Three weeks later, Erica was in the OR doing a triple bypass surgery when she suddenly felt intense pain and a flow of blood descending down her thighs. It was only seconds later that she was on the floor with blood spilling from her uterus and the massive tumour that was growing there onto the sterile, OR floor. Her interns who were watching from the back swarmed around her and were trying to help stem the bleeding but the failing surgeon on the floor knew that her time had come and it was the moment that had been coming ever since Dr. Grundig had informed her that she had a malignant tumour that was too far gone to operate on and that she had about a month to live, but obviously she had lived too fully for three weeks to make it to a full month.

* * *

"Tell Meredith that I love her," Lexie said faintly, trying not to scream in pain as she uttered every word to the love of her life who was repeating that he in turn loved her over and over and over again and then said that they needed to get married in their future together, "that's nice."

Alexandra Caroline Grey felt the life seeping from her body through every hole that the weight crushing her lower half and left arm had left in her body. She was comforted only by the fact that Mark Sloan, beautiful, bright, funny Mark Sloan was by her side and appeared to be healthy and relatively unscathed from the plane crash. He would survive and find love again and be able to see his precious daughter graduate and get married.

She tried to remember as Mark spoke sweet nothings to her how she had come to be here, lying under the back section of a plane that was meant to be carrying all of them to Boise, Idaho to operate on some babies, but it was a struggle to remember the chronology of just precisely what had happened up in the air.

In the back of the plane, she had just been sitting quietly, reading an issue of "The New England Journal of Medicine" on her iPad, when she felt a jolt come from beneath her and saw in the faces of her friends, her family and her colleagues, fear. As the plane jostled from side to side and tipped as it nosedived towards the ground, she grasped onto one of the straps next to her. It was with widened eyes and an open mouth that Lexie watched as the plane split in two and Derek was swept out of the middle and out into the air. She lost sight of the forefront of the plane as the back fell away and the next time she was aware of anything at all was when she saw Mark and Cristina heading towards her.

"We're meant to be together." Mark said, his face reddened with anger and fear that the one person in whom he had found a kindred spirit was about to be taken away from him forever.

Lexie smiled at him, trying to imprint his face into her mind to eradicate the fear that had taken hold there as she breathed her last but managed to agree with him with her last words, "We're meant to be."

Then, she let go. She let go of all the pain and all the grief and all the love that she felt in that last moment and shut her eyes for the final time.

* * *

Mark felt half of his heart shorn from his chest in the second that Lexie stopped breathing and her heart stopped beating. She was the one person who made him better. He thought it was Derek who made him a better man but it wasn't, it was her, it was Lexie Grey, his Little Grey.

As he lay in his hospital bed, hooked up to all the tubes and pipes which were sustaining his life, but not giving him any form of consciousness. All the while he was comatose in his bed, unable to see or talk to any of his friends or family, he dreamt and thought about everything and tried to process what had just befallen him on the plane and in the woods after the crash.

He knew that he had been technically dead on more than one occasion and that none other than Cristina Yang had saved him and kept him alive under such challenging circumstances and conditions. It was extraordinarily selfish of him but he silently wished that she had just allowed him to die in the same woods as Lexie and let him pass quietly and with dignity from the world where there was just pain for him because Lexie was not around anymore.

Dreams of Sofia went through his mind. Dreams of her growing up, her first boyfriend, her graduation, her junior prom, her senior prom, her going to college, her wedding and her first child were all he could think of for hours. He knew that he would not be around to see any of those events with Callie and Arizona, who were superstars and would cope, but he wanted Sofia to have a father and to be loved by all three of her parents.

When he finally woke up, he saw the face of the one woman whom he loved, "Hey, Torres, where you been?"

The relief that swam across her face was beautiful. Callie Torres did not know how beautiful and amazing she relaly was, that was what attracted Mark to her initially and then had prompted him to let her be his best friend and to endeavour to be a good one to her in return. He was so glad that she was the mother of his daughter and his family. He knew she would have been zooming between his and Arizona's rooms and the fact that she had appeared in her cute pyjamas meant that his unexpected return to consciousness had interrupted the forced (probably by Derek) and vital respite that she had taken.

He was very well aware that his awakening was most likely down to The Surge but he had to make the most of it while it lasted. It was because of this that he sent the other member of The Plastics Posse to sneak his beautiful daughter out of day care and into the ICU. It was such a shame that before Avery managed to make it back with the baby, his time was up. He felt himself lapse again and knew that he was going to see Lexie and it was for the best. He had heard that there would be a substantial settlement given to the wounded from the crash and if he died, whatever he got would instantaneously be left for Sofia. He was leaving knowing that his daughter and his entire family would be safe and secure. That was all he could ask for in this world.

As Mark's soul left his body, he revelled in the feeling of Callie and Derek, the two people who had made him the man he died as, a good man, touching him and saying goodbye to him.

He expected there to be nothing after death. He was not religious, he did not believe in anything, not heaven or hell, so when he felt himself wake up after feeling himself die, he was pleasantly surprised. He was also so happy that standing, dressed in red and looking like the goddess he knew she was, was Lexie Grey.

"Hello, you." He greeted her with his standard suave smile.

The woman, who was Lexie, turned on her heels and stared at him in shock and grief and screamed. She broke down because her lover was with her here, which meant that he had died. Mark had died.

"Hi, you two," George O'Malley said to his former roommate and her ex-boyfriend.

Erica Hahn appeared on the scene too, "Oh, this is just perfect! I die and hope for green pastures and meadows with wildflowers and what do I get? It's people from Seattle fricking Grace with me for eternity in heaven!"


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's Note: **Part of what motivated me to write this story in this particular way is the fact that one of my theology modules this semester is entitled "Heaven & Hell Through the Ages" and I have been really enjoying studying eschatology and the effect it has on people's lives, but – as most of us do, I believe – I wanted to explore and write creatively about what Heaven holds for us. I am a Quaker, so some elements of my faith will – I suspect – make their way into the story, but I am by no means saying in this story that anyone who is not a Christian will not make it to Heaven, as I think I outline later in this chapter, but I want to be absolutely clear so I do not offend or hurt anybody. Thanks very much for your interest in this story and please do read and review it for me!

* * *

"_Though lovers be lost, love shall not; And death shall have no dominion."_

~ Dylan Thomas

"Lexie, Lexie honey," Mark said gently, bending down next to the sobbing woman, "don't cry, babe, we're together, it's what we always wanted and what we deserve: to be together forever, in heaven. Ha, what a joke! Never believed in squat and now here I am, Mark Sloan, in heaven of all places!"

The woman being held to the chest of the man she had learned to love while on Earth, was having no success staunching her tears, so instead through heart-wrenching and gut-wrenching wails, she bawled out, "But this means you're dead, Mark, you're dead! I knew that one day you'd be up here with me, once I got here, but I never suspected that it would be so soon. I wanted you to live, to find someone new and to be with Sofia. You bloody coward! You left them all, your family to just die and be with me! I love you so much, Mark, but you shouldn't have died so soon…"

"Hush, love, hush," Mark cooed as he stroked his lover's beautiful hair, "don't fret about it now. It's happened now, so there's no changing it or wishing it undone. Just let it be and hell, be excited a bit that you've got Mark Sloan up here, Mark Sloan, the love of your life and – it seems – your death."

Lexie managed to turn her wretched sobs into choked laughter at his glib understanding of their situation and in her newfound humour, she realised that they had temporarily forgotten their companions, who had merely stood silently observing the reunited lovers.

"Well, this is just peachy, Sloan. You got the girl up here too as well as down there, how nice for you."

Mark rolled his eyes, "Hahn for some reason that's beyond me, you're in heaven with me, so turn down the sarcasm before God hears you."

George scoffed, "You don't even believe in God!"

"Hello, I'm in Heaven, if there ever was a time to start, it has come, O'Malley," he suddenly looked the other man in the eyes and murmured, "but it's good to see you again. We missed you down there…a lot."

"What about me? Bet nobody down there gives a crap about me. Probably singing 'Ding Dong! The Witch Is Dead' as we speak."

"Hahn," Mark started with his typical enigmatic smile, "Callie missed you, I missed you too but we got over it. Come on, woman, you stormed out of the hospital, out of the city without a word! What did you expect?"

Erica scoffed at her unlikely friend, "At least you're still honest, Sloan."

Since Lexie had stopped bawling her eyes out on the floor and got to her feet with Mark following suit, everyone just looked at each other in deathly silence, unable to comprehend how the four of them had wound up in heaven together until all they could do next was burst out in teary floods of laughter at the hand Fate had dealt them.

"We are pathetic!" Erica blurted out, the radiance of her giggling face spreading to the irises of her eyes.

George nodded, "I think this might be some kind of joke."

"It's not funny!" Lexie rebutted.

Mark guffawed, "No, it's hysterical!"

Their jubilant laughter continued steadily for the next few minutes, but none of them noticed until they were interrupted by another presence, a presence that shut them up instantly and left three of them with wide, open mouths. Only George was unsurprised and familiar with the man who was walking, as if he walked on clouds, towards them.

"I can't believe you are real, that you exist," George whispered, utterly aghast.

The older, middle-aged man smiled serenely at the young doctor, "Yes, you did, brother. You have known since you were small that we would be meeting one day despite everything. Your mother taught you about me, delightful and faithful woman that she is and you never strayed from the belief that I am real and that you would end up here."

"O'Malley," Mark snapped, "who is this guy?"

Lexie breathed, "Is he Jesus?"

Everyone but George inspected the newcomer who was dressed in stunning ivory robes, Lexie noted, not white. He had a beard that was brown but flecked with the signs of old age, white hairs. His eyes were hazelnut brown and his robes almost reached his feet and his hands, but they did not cover the scars that were on his ankles and matching ones on his hands. The group's belief that the man standing before them was Jesus Christ was not waning at all.

"No, he's not Christ," George replied, smiling at the man before him and gesturing to a golden girdle at his waist with a hoop with seven long, brass key hanging from it, one that was like the ones that you see on Showtime television shows when Henry VIII conquers Boulogne and is handed the keys to the city.

The nameless man announced to the group, "I am Saint Peter, First Bishop of Rome, Apostle of Jesus Christ, Our Lord and the Keeper of the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven and your guide."

"How? Who? What? Seriously?" Lexie blurted out, incapable of understanding how this man, this angel existed and was standing before her.

"My sister, you have never been able to believe in what you cannot read, see or remember," the saint said with kindness and consideration seeping from his words, "and that is not your fault. Even when you were a child, you were always so practical and logical. Religion and faith in the Lord Almighty could never take hold in your soul because you had already placed your faith in medicine there and it is your faith that has led to you me after your death, when you were ready to accept it. All of you are here because of your faith in medicine and how many lives you were able to save through that faith. That's all anyone needs to do to end up here: believe in something and believe so powerfully in whatever it is that it has the ability to save lives, whether it's the lives of other people or even your own life. It does not even have to be the God of Abraham, it can be Buddha or Vishnu or Krishna or Allah. Everyone with a good and rational soul ascends to the Kingdom of Heaven."

"Great, good man," Mark commended the guy, shaking him firmly by the hand, "they're reasonable prerequisites for Heaven. Good to know that up here it's so much healthier than what people down there think they need to do to get up here: all that killing and exorcism and crap!"

Erica rolled her eyes, "Mark, this is Heaven and you're swearing! God, you're so inappropriate. You'd think you'd change after you died."

"Why? You haven't!" He retorted quickly.

Saint Peter chuckled like he had seen people like this before and offered his opinion to the female physician, "Erica Hahn…I have been looking forward to having you up here for years. Not that I have been wishing for your death, but you are going to be a breath of fresh air up here. I always enjoyed watching you make other people uncomfortable with your outlandish humour, but I will inform you that you just blasphemed while you were telling your companion here to cease profaning."

Erica looked down shyly for the first time in her life (or death?) at Peter's words, "I am sorry."

Mark laughed, "This must be Heaven. You've just got Erica Hahn, the woman who never says sorry, to apologise for something."

"Mark Sloan, you have one of the biggest hearts of any I have seen pass through the gates and you were such a scallywag when you were growing up, yet you still portray yourself as an uncharitable and harsh man who all who don't' really know you. You are in Heaven now, with the woman you love no less, so relax, brother, and be yourself. This woman, Alexandra Caroline Grey, is your ideal match and your glove, a perfect fit and the pair of you could not be as one on Earth, so now you are here and you have an _eternity _together with each other and with your friends here. Do not be fools and waste it."

Mark and Lexie took a moment to smile at each other as they realised the wisdom of what their guide was telling them before the former pulled Lexie towards him and kissed her sweetly on the lips. Once they had relished their romantic moment together, they looked at their friends and in that moment, all four of them were ecstatic that they were not going to be alone in Heaven for eternity, because frankly, all of them were aware that eternity was a bloody long time.

"There is one more boon that we would like to grant all of you, one that we rarely extend to people. We are going to give you The Sight. It means that you will be able to watch the people whom you loved while you are up here: your friends and your families. It is the ultimate gift we can bestow upon you. It is your reward for the good you have done in your lives."


End file.
